Fifteen years of carbon capture and storage (CCS) success in Victoria

Readers may be surprised to learn that one of the world’s largest CCS research projects has been safely and successfully operating in Victoria for the past 15 years.

While carbon capture and storage (CCS) might seem like a new technology in the conversation around the growing hydrogen economy, few Australians may know that one of the world’s largest CCS projects has been taking place in their own backyard since 2007.

As part of CO2CRC’s Otway International Test Centre (OITC), over 95,000 tonnes of CO2 have successfully been injected and securely stored at a CCS site in Nirranda South, Victoria since 2007.

As a supporting organisation of the Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain (HESC) Project, the Otway Research Facility is a world-leading project to demonstrate that CCS is a technically and environmentally safe way to make deep cuts into global greenhouse gas emissions.

A commercial-scale HESC project could produce 225,000 tonnes of clean hydrogen annually with carbon capture and storage.

“We estimate our project could reduce CO2 emissions by 1.8 million tonnes per year, equivalent to the emissions of some 350,000 petrol cars” Jeremy Stone, Non-Executive Director of J-Power Latrobe Valley said.

CO2CRC uses the research facility to understand the impact of CCS solutions in a global, economic, environmental, and societal context and has previously shared findings with CSIRO, HESC, CarbonNet and other project partners.

The findings from the Otway Research Facility are shared with political leaders, government officials, regulators and communities to help explain and better understand CCS in action.

The HESC Project Partners are looking forward to the findings from the latest Stage 3 Project that has been completed and which is developing next generation subsurface CO2 monitoring and verification technologies for application in commercial carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects.

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